Ramaphosa can’t alone change ANC

I have no problem with President Cyril Ramaphosa, per se.

He has negotiation ability, and political and diplomatic prowess, constitutional expertise, and he is an excellent and talented speaker.

There is a saying in English, “one swallow does not make a summer”.

I spotted a postulation by Peter Bruce in The Herald on Friday (“For sake of SA, I stand with Cyril”) and another opinion piece on Monday (“In Ramaphosa we (voters) trust”) that suggest that because Ramaphosa has all the qualities mentioned above and is president of the ANC, automatically he would be a Messiah to the ANC and, as a consequences, to the whole of SA.

This is a big mistake and [this confidence] is misplaced.

As much as Ramaphosa is a very good man, he remains an ANC loyal cadre.

This is very important to take notice of and scrutinise very carefully.

Why it is important is because Ramaphosa cannot unilaterally execute his wisdom, if he wished to, without the nod from the ANC.

To accentuate my argument, I would like to outline it below:

Does anybody who is reasonable associate and matches Ramaphosa’s characteristics with the characteristics of Nomvula Mokonyane, Bathabile Dlamini, Malusi Gigaba, Ace Magashule, Mduduzi Manana and other bad elements within the ANC? Nope.

Their characters and Ramaphosa’s are as far apart as day and night.

But because Ramaphosa is a loyal member of the ANC, he can’t do otherwise, he just had to reluctantly associate with them.

He has no choice. Magashule shunned him openly and showed his allegiance to former president Jacob Zuma, travelled from Johannesburg to Durban, without Ramaphosa’s permission, and went to meet Zuma.

It is believed that he went there to plan a fight-back against Ramaphosa.

Ramaphosa could do nothing about it and Magashule, his open foe in the ANC, is now a loose cannon, saying all wrong things with impunity. What can Ramaphosa do? Zero. Ramaphosa is not content that Zuma should campaign for the ANC, due to his reputational deficit.

Zuma ignores him and goes around campaigning, openly despising Ramaphosa.

Ramaphosa, by his character, I believe, would have liked a lot of people on the ANC election list taken off, owing to their corrupt and dubious standings.

As much as he would have liked to, he can’t.

The power is in the ANC and sometimes the secretarygeneral of the ANC has a propensity to manipulate things in the ANC without Ramaphosa’s knowledge.

What I am trying to highlight here is that it is neither true nor possible to isolate Ramaphosa from the ANC, by saying you will be voting for Ramaphosa, not for the ANC.

By implication, voting for Ramaphosa, you vote for the corrupt ANC, as a group or discredited individuals like Magashule and Ramaphosa’s abilities mentioned above are dormant by virtue of being a loyal member of the ANC.

It is like saying, “I vote for the head, not for the body” – these parts are one, intact and inseparable.

One swallow does not make a summer.

It does not mean that Ramaphosa, all alone, will save and change the ANC. Putting it straight

Uitenhage